I WANT MY SHRIMP BACK!!
/n/
How can we keep crabs, lobster and shrimp in /n/?
Crustacean Manifesto for Crustacea
Crustacea is our planet we must fight censorship!
Crustaceans (Crustacea /krʌˈsteɪʃə/) form a very large group of arthropods, usually treated as a subphylum, which includes such familiar animals as crabs, lobsters, crayfish, shrimp, krill and barnacles.
The 67,000 described species range in size from Stygotantulus stocki at 0.1 mm (0.004 in), to the Japanese spider crab with a leg span of up to 3.8 m (12.5 ft) and a mass of 20 kg (44 lb). Like other arthropods, crustaceans have an exoskeleton, which they moult to grow. They are distinguished from other groups of arthropods, such as insects, myriapods and chelicerates, by the possession of biramous (two-parted) limbs, and by their larval forms, such as the nauplius stage of branchiopods and copepods.
Most crustaceans are free-living aquatic animals, but some are terrestrial (e.g. woodlice), some are parasitic (e.g. Rhizocephala, fish lice, tongue worms) and some are sessile (e.g. barnacles). The group has an extensive fossil record, reaching back to the Cambrian, and includes living fossils such as Triops cancriformis, which has existed apparently unchanged since the Triassic period. More than 10 million tons of crustaceans are produced by fishery or farming for human consumption, the majority of it being shrimp and prawns.
Krill and copepods are not as widely fished, but may be the animals with the greatest biomass on the planet, and form a vital part of the food chain. The scientific study of crustaceans is known as carcinology (alternatively, malacostracology, crustaceology or crustalogy), and a scientist who works in carcinology is a carcinologist.
Crustaceans have a rich and extensive fossil record, which begins with animals such as Canadaspis and Perspicaris from the Middle Cambrian age Burgess Shale.[40][41] Most of the major groups of crustaceans appear in the fossil record before the end of the Cambrian, namely the Branchiopoda, Maxillopoda (including barnacles and tongue worms) and Malacostraca; there is some debate as to whether or not Cambrian animals assigned to Ostracoda are truly ostracods, which would otherwise start in the Ordovician.[42]
The only classes to appear later are the Cephalocarida,[43] which have no fossil record, and the Remipedia, which were first described from the fossil Tesnusocaris goldichi, but do not appear until the Carboniferous.[44] Most of the early crustaceans are rare, but fossil crustaceans become abundant from the Carboniferous period onwards.[40]
A heap of small pink lobsters on their sides, with their claws extended forwards towards the camera.
Norway lobsters on sale at a Spanish market
Within the Malacostraca, no fossils are known for krill,[45] while both Hoplocarida and Phyllopoda contain important groups that are now extinct as well as extant members (Hoplocarida: mantis shrimp are extant, while Aeschronectida are extinct;[46] Phyllopoda: Canadaspidida are extinct, while Leptostraca are extant[41]). Cumacea and Isopoda are both known from the Carboniferous,[47][48] as are the first true mantis shrimp.[49]
In the Decapoda, prawns and polychelids appear in the Triassic,[50][51] and shrimp and crabs appear in the Jurassic;[52][53] however, the great radiation of crustaceans occurred in the Cretaceous, particularly in crabs, and may have been driven by the adaptive radiation of their main predators, bony fish.[53] The first true lobsters also appear in the Cretaceous.[54]
Krill are small crustaceans of the order Euphausiacea, and are found in all the world's oceans. The name krill comes from the Norwegian word krill, meaning "small fry of fish",[1] which is also often attributed to species of fish.
Krill are considered an important trophic level connection – near the bottom of the food chain – because they feed on phytoplankton and to a lesser extent zooplankton, converting these into a form suitable for many larger animals for whom krill makes up the largest part of their diet. In the Southern Ocean, one species, the Antarctic krill, Euphausia superba, makes up an estimated biomass of around 379,000,000 tonnes,[2] making it among the species with the largest total biomass. Of this, over half is eaten by whales, seals, penguins, squid and fish each year, and is replaced by growth and reproduction. Most krill species display large daily vertical migrations, thus providing food for predators near the surface at night and in deeper waters during the day.
Krill are fished commercially in the Southern Ocean and in the waters around Japan. The total global harvest amounts to 150,000–200,000 tonnes annually, most of this from the Scotia Sea. Most of the krill catch is used for aquaculture and aquarium feeds, as bait in sport fishing, or in the pharmaceutical industry. In Japan, Philippines and Russia, krill is also used for human consumption and is known as okiami (オキアミ?) in Japan. In the Philippines, it is known as "alamang" and it is used to make a salty paste called bagoong.
Krill is also the main prey of baleen whales, including the blue whale.
Be wary of surgically enhanced operatives that may look like us but can never be one of us!
Crustaceans in Harmony with others
So many beautiful stories of Crustacea being blessed by Crustaceans.
I say we make a crustacean thread. Post your top crustaceans and rate other crustaceans! Rally the cause kin!
Do you guys like crab girls?
I hate crabs, they frighten me, I've had nightmares with them.
Kill them all, keep them away from my sight.
Hey /krillcen/
know any good crab toys?
Climax of the Crab Migration
A climax has been reached for Christmas Island’s crabs as the final day of spawning kicked off this morning just before dawn.
Female crabs were seen in their millions, carpeting the cliffs and beaches of he island as they each tentatively tiptoed into the water and shook off their large sacks of eggs into the outgoing tide.
They massacre us and then they call us creepy
Named for the day it was discovered in 1643 and located a few hundred miles south of Indonesia, Christmas Island is home to around 45 million red crabs. Every year, these charismatic crustaceans—each about the size of your fist—crawl all over the 52-square-mile island and head to sea en masse to spawn. (This year’s migration began in early December.) People fly in from around the world to witness what resembles armies of cherry Christmas bulbs on the march.
It would seem no force could harry such a legion, armed as it is with claws and chitin. And yet, the crabs have a formidable enemy.
On Christmas Island, an estimated 43.7 million Christmas Island red crabs dwell. That’s a truly staggering number of crabs living on such a small island; But, if hordes of adult Christmas Island red crabs seemed incredible enough, their tiny children are even more mind-numbing. After spending three to four weeks at sea, the baby red crabs crawl from the water and begin their nine day journey to the center of Christmas Island. This results in an even greater and creepier horde than that of their migrating parents.
Some however cherish our presence
The island is rich in biological diversity and contains some unique organisms. 63% of the island belongs to a national park.
The scientific name of the red crab is Gecarcoidea natalis. It's native to Christmas Island and the Cocos or Keeling Islands, which are also located in the Indian Ocean and are also a territory of Australia.
The red crab is quite large compared to other crabs. Its carapace, or shell, may reach as much as 4.6 inches in width. Males are generally bigger than females. Although the crab is usually red in colour, some individuals are orange. Very rarely, a red crab may be purple in colour.